The present invention relates to a vehicle body reinforcing structure between a front body and a side body of a vehicle body.
Generally, the vehicle body of a motor vehicle excluding openable portions such as an engine hood, doors, and the like, is called a body shell. The body shell can be divided broadly into a front body constituting the front portion of vehicle body, a rear body constituting the rear portion thereof, a side body constituting a side wall thereof, and an underbody constituting the lower surface thereof.
Among these bodies, the front body is the front end in the travel direction of the vehicle body, and is a portion liable to be subjected to a load from the front during running. When the front body is subjected to a load, the load is transmitted to portions at the rear of the front body. The front body is connected with the side body on the rear side thereof, and the load is concentrated particularly on the connecting location of the front body and the side body. Therefore, the connecting location is required to have a rigidity capable of withstanding the load.
Conventionally, in the connecting location of the front body and the side body, a connecting member called an outer member or an outer frame has been used. For example, Patent Document 1 (JP 2005-75130 A) discloses a vehicle body frame structure in which the front body and the side body are connected to each other by an outer frame member.
In Patent Document 1, the outer frame member is reinforced by fastening a body panel and a reinforcement member, which form the skeleton of a side body, and a door hinge upper part, which is provided at a door mounting position of these members, together by using bolts. Patent Document 1 describes that the endurance strength of a vehicle body can be improved by fastening the outer frame member to the above-described members together.
In Patent Document 1, the outer frame member is fixed to the front body and the side body so that the longitudinal direction thereof is substantially parallel with the longitudinal direction of the vehicle body. Therefore, it is thought that a load received by the side body from the front body in front of the side body via the outer frame member has a directivity substantially along the longitudinal direction of the vehicle body. In Patent Document 1, the side body in a location in which the outer frame member is fixed, that is, the body panel and the reinforcement member, and the door hinge upper part are members fabricated three-dimensionally by bending a sheet metal like the structure of a general vehicle body. For example, in FIG. 3 of Patent Document 1, the member such as the body panel is of a plate shape, and is curved so as to be convex toward the vehicle body outside. However, in such a curved configuration, it is difficult to think that a high rigidity can be achieved in the curved direction, so that the endurance strength of the body panel and the like against the load received from the outer frame member may be restricted structurally.